(TNS) A federal judge Thursday said she was considering ordering the Trump administration not to suspend Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food benefits amid the ongoing government shutdown.

District Court Judge Indira Talwani sounded like she mostly agreed with the demand by New York Attorney General Letitia James and 24 other Democratic-led states that federal officials should tap an emergency fund to keep SNAP benefits flowing to about 42 million low-income Americans.

“You are not going to make everyone drop dead because it’s a political game someplace,” Talwani told a lawyer for the federal U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the program.

The judge presiding over a preliminary hearing in Boston federal court noted that Congress appropriated money for the

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